Reston, Va., June 27, 2023 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Who: Members of the National Court Reporters Association (NCRA), the country’s leading organization representing stenographic court reporters, captioners, and legal videographers, who serve on the Association’s STRONG Committee, are available to discuss the perils of relying on artificial intelligence (AI) and digital recordings to capture the official record. These methods can easily jeopardize a person’s right to a fair trial or appeal, as well as subject personal identifiable information (PII) to potential unsecured situations. NCRA’s STRONG Committee works to promote stenographic captioning and court reporting as the best means to maintain the accuracy of the record.
- Learn more now by contacting Annemarie Roketenetz at pr@ncra.org, to set up an interview about issues being posed by the use of AI and digital recording methods.
What: Key points every consumer should know, and every courtroom should not ignore
- This is the story about the infiltration of algorithmic bias into our justice system as courts experiment with ASR.
- Every week, there are new releases and new discoveries in the arms race of artificial intelligence. ChatGPT has disrupted multiple markets from journalism to academia to coding to search engines, but the public is largely uninformed about this story as it pertains to the courts and our justice system.
- For decades, for-profit companies and court administrators have been trying to replace certified and licensed court stenographers with recording devices. The magnetic cassette tape has given way to digital recording systems, and while all claim to replace human stenographic court reporters for less cost, in reality they can be more expensive to implement and maintain and are far less reliable.
- Human stenographic court reporters cannot be stopped by power outages, internet failures , overlapping speech, or background noise. When recording systems fail, the results can be not only catastrophic and costly, but life-altering for the people involved.
- As real concerns about deepfakes emerge, court reporters are a firewall of neutrality. They provide an unbiased certification to their first-hand knowledge and faithful record of proceedings, guarantee a chain of custody of that record, and are backed by regulatory and licensing oversight.
Where: It’s happening across the nation
- Legislation and court rules attempting to enable these subpar methods are already pending in states like California and Illinois and are already doing real damage in others such as Texas and Alaska. Taxpayers need to know if the aforementioned for-profit companies are engaging in back-office conversations with decision makers. Without journalists sounding the alarm, these changes may be implemented without the input and scrutiny of the general public. If we wait until the truly horrific technology-enabled miscarriages of justice start rolling in, it will be too late.
Why: The cost is high when it comes to protecting the fairness and integrity of our judicial proceedings
- Courts are experimenting with AI and audio recording equipment repackaged for the legal sector, using real cases and litigants as guinea pigs. These deals are happening quietly behind closed doors between court administrators and large tech companies who stand to profit from the monopolization and monetization of court documents.
- To the informed tech enthusiast, it will come as no surprise that the predictive text models upon which these speech recognition engines are built are shockingly discriminatory against people of color; women; individuals with disabilities; or individuals who have unique speech patterns, accents, or dialects. The fact that this nascent and unproven technology is being proposed in one of our most important and consequential venues, the justice system, should be of utmost concern.
The court reporting and captioning professions offer viable career choices that do not require a four-year college degree and yet offer good salaries, flexible schedules, and interesting venues.
Court reporters and captioners rely on the latest in technology, using stenographic machines along with advanced computer programs to capture the spoken word and translate it into written text in real time. These professionals work both in and out of the courtroom preserving court proceedings and depositions, providing live captioning of events, and assisting members of the deaf and hard-of-hearing communities with gaining access to information, entertainment, educational opportunities, and more.
To arrange an interview with a working court reporter or captioner, or to learn more about the lucrative and flexible court reporting or captioning professions and the many job opportunities currently available, contact pr@ncra.org.
About NCRA
The National Court Reporters Association (NCRA) has been internationally recognized for promoting excellence among those who capture and convert the spoken word to text for more than 100 years. NCRA is committed to supporting its more than 12,000 members in achieving the highest level of professional expertise with educational opportunities and industry-recognized court reporting, educator, and videographer certification programs. NCRA impacts legislative issues and the global marketplace through its actively involved membership.
Forbes has named court reporting as one of the best career options that do not require a traditional four-year degree. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that the court reporting field is expected to be one of the fastest areas of projected employment growth across all occupations. According to 247/WallSt.com, the court reporting profession ranks sixth out of 25 careers with the lowest unemployment rate, just 0.7 percent. Career information about the court reporting profession—one of the leading career options that do not require a traditional four-year degree—can be found at NCRA DiscoverSteno.org.
